Ebola

KIKWIT, Zaire -- For Casongo Malele, the news that her sister was being moved from Ward 3 to Ward 2 in the overtaxed hospital here, the epicenter of Zaire's Ebola virus epidemic, was a sign of hope.Like nearly everyone in this city of 500,000, Miss Malele, a 24-year-old student, had come to regard Ward 3 as a sort of terminus for those stricken by the disease, whose symptoms of bloody diarrhea and vomiting are now known and dreaded by all here."You have to avoid touching their blood, their saliva, their vomit or their stools," Miss Malele explained, confident that, with her mastery of these precautions, she would soon be given gloves and a mask and allowed to enter the ward to see her older sister, a nurse-trainee at the hospital.

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa - Some of the viruses are already notorious, such as Ebola and HIV. Others have less familiar names: Marburg and Lassa fever. But they share one feature: All have emerged in recent decades from sub-Saharan Africa, perplexing scientists and, in the case of HIV, killing millions. Africa is now recognized as an ideal incubator for new pathogens: It has rapidly growing human populations and high biodiversity, along with widespread poverty, poor medical care and, in many countries, armed conflict that forces civilians to flee far from their homes.

FREDERICK -- Behind sea-green cinder block walls and stainless steel doors, protected by space suits and sterilizing chemical showers, scientists here are searching for weapons to fight one of Earth's most dangerous predators.This is Fort Detrick's U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases, or USAMRIID, one of only five laboratories in the world equipped for the study of such super-lethal, untreatable diseases as Marburg, Lassa and Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever.But recent books, a movie and a deadly epidemic in Africa have focused an international spotlight on USAMRIID's work on one murderous microbe in particular: the Ebola virus.

A Fort Detrick researcher who officials feared might have been accidentally infected with the Ebola virus left the Army's quarantine unit yesterday, healthy and relieved to be free after nearly three weeks in enforced isolation. "She was very happy to get out, and she expressed her gratitude to everyone who supported her containment care," said Chuck Dasey, an Army spokesman. At the researcher's request, her name has not been released. The researcher, a virologist at the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases, grazed her hand with a needle Feb. 11 while inoculating Ebola-infected mice.

The prick of a needle, the slip of a scalpel -- routine accidents in any hospital or medical lab. But for the scientists who work with nature's deadliest germs, handling razor-sharp instruments in the clumsy spacesuits of the nation's highest-security biodefense research centers, momentary mistakes are the stuff of nightmares. In a Fort Detrick isolation unit known as "the slammer," a young virologist is in the 10th day of a watch for symptoms of Ebola, a highly contagious disease in which headache and fever can swiftly progress to uncontrollable bleeding and death.

A female researcher at Fort Detrick in Frederick may have been exposed to the Ebola virus last week when she grazed her hand with a needle she was using to inject mice with the virus. The researcher, who was working in the Army's Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases, has been staying in an isolation area since the incident Feb. 11, said spokesman Chuck Dasey. She has shown no signs of infection, he said. Medical technicians have been testing blood samples from the researcher for traces of the virus, Dasey said.

FREDERICK -- Dressed in thick rubber gloves, surgical garb and a helmet that fed him microbe-free air, Capt. Neal E. Woollen spent workday afternoons over the past two months standing in a clearing in an African forest, dissecting gazelles, lizards, monkeys, mongooses and jackals.The Army veterinarian was part of an international team of scientists sent to the city of Kikwit, in central Zaire, after an outbreak of the lethal Ebola virus. That outbreak has infected 296 people and killed 233 -- a mortality rate of almost 80 percent.

Since the April outbreak of Ebola virus infection in Africa, I have been asked by a concerned public to allay concerns about the risk of Ebola for Americans. I also have been asked why this and other terrifying viruses seem to emerge from places like Africa on a regular basis to threaten us with illness and destruction. I hope to answer these questions in this article.For those of you who have not followed the African outbreak of Ebola virus in the news media, I can tell you that the illness caused by Ebola virus is riveting.

ENTEBBE, Uganda - An outbreak of hemorrhagic fever that has killed dozens of people in northern Uganda has been identified by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta as the Ebola virus, a CDC official in Uganda said late yesterday. "It's estimated that there are 40 deaths, and two of those have been nursing students," said Dr. Jonathan Mermin, the CDC's team leader in Uganda. The disease is highly infectious and has a mortality rate of about 90 percent when it initially enters the human population, Mermin said.

FREDERICK -- Government scientists wearing plastic "space suits" planned to work all though last night to determine if the Ebola virus that infected at least two monkeys at a Texas breeding facility had spread to a second monkey house there.The scientists, at Fort Detrick's U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID), continued their probe as Texas health officials began killing 48 monkeys in a building run by a company that supplies animals to research laboratories around the country.

The prick of a needle, the slip of a scalpel -- routine accidents in any hospital or medical lab. But for the scientists who work with nature's deadliest germs, handling razor-sharp instruments in the clumsy spacesuits of the nation's highest-security biodefense research centers, momentary mistakes are the stuff of nightmares. In a Fort Detrick isolation unit known as "the slammer," a young virologist is in the 10th day of a watch for symptoms of Ebola, a highly contagious disease in which headache and fever can swiftly progress to uncontrollable bleeding and death.

A female researcher at Fort Detrick in Frederick may have been exposed to the Ebola virus last week when she grazed her hand with a needle she was using to inject mice with the virus. The researcher, who was working in the Army's Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases, has been staying in an isolation area since the incident Feb. 11, said spokesman Chuck Dasey. She has shown no signs of infection, he said. Medical technicians have been testing blood samples from the researcher for traces of the virus, Dasey said.

Army scientists said yesterday that they had taken an important step toward a possible treatment for the deadly Ebola virus in humans by successfully treating monkeys with the disease for the first time. In tests of an experimental drug among a small number of monkeys that were deliberately infected with Ebola, one-third survived, the scientists reported in The Lancet medical journal. Ebola infection, which causes severe internal bleeding, is usually 100 percent fatal among monkeys and 80 percent among humans.

The first test in humans of an experimental vaccine against the deadly Ebola virus began yesterday, U.S. government scientists said. The vaccine, administered by injection, was designed to try to prevent outbreaks of the lethal hemorrhagic fever where it occurs naturally in Africa. It is also a bid to thwart any efforts to use the highly infectious virus as a bioterrorist agent. As part of a standard three-stage process, the first phase involves testing the vaccine's safety. Scientists also plan to measure immune responses among volunteers receiving the shots.

An epidemic of Ebola virus is sweeping through central Africa's jungles, devastating the region's great apes. The virus has likely killed tens of thousands of chimpanzees and lowland gorillas, and could soon reach one of the world's largest populations of these animals. The virus represents a major new menace to two species already besieged by hunting and habitat loss. While scientists knew about limited outbreaks of Ebola among apes, only recently have researchers recognized the epidemic's scope.

Antonio Margheriti, 72, a prolific Italian film director who sometimes used the name Anthony M. Dawson and specialized in science fiction, horror and adventure movies, died of a heart attack Monday in Rome. Mr. Margheriti started his film career in the 1960s, directing science-fiction films such as Space Men and The Battle of the Worlds. He later moved into the horror genre with The Virgin of Nuremberg, which was released in 1965 in the United States with the title Horror Castle and carried the name Dawson as its director.

Army scientists said yesterday that they had taken an important step toward a possible treatment for the deadly Ebola virus in humans by successfully treating monkeys with the disease for the first time. In tests of an experimental drug among a small number of monkeys that were deliberately infected with Ebola, one-third survived, the scientists reported in The Lancet medical journal. Ebola infection, which causes severe internal bleeding, is usually 100 percent fatal among monkeys and 80 percent among humans.

An epidemic of Ebola virus is sweeping through central Africa's jungles, devastating the region's great apes. The virus has likely killed tens of thousands of chimpanzees and lowland gorillas, and could soon reach one of the world's largest populations of these animals. The virus represents a major new menace to two species already besieged by hunting and habitat loss. While scientists knew about limited outbreaks of Ebola among apes, only recently have researchers recognized the epidemic's scope.

ENTEBBE, Uganda - An outbreak of hemorrhagic fever that has killed dozens of people in northern Uganda has been identified by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta as the Ebola virus, a CDC official in Uganda said late yesterday. "It's estimated that there are 40 deaths, and two of those have been nursing students," said Dr. Jonathan Mermin, the CDC's team leader in Uganda. The disease is highly infectious and has a mortality rate of about 90 percent when it initially enters the human population, Mermin said.

Land mines make Senegal province unusable, report saysDAKAR -- Land mines have made 80 percent of land in Senegal's fertile southern province of Casamance unusable, a local human rights watchdog said yesterday.The RADDHO (African Grouping for Human Rights) said that the anti-personnel mines, blamed mainly on separatist rebels, had killed or wounded close to 500 people this year through August, including 61 soldiers.The Movement of Democratic Forces of Casamance took up arms in 1982, accusing the former French colony's central government of neglecting the province.